


Ethereal Beauty

by Imagination_Parade



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Episode: s02e04 And the Cost of Education, F/F, Magic and Science, Spells & Enchantments, Temptation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 13:41:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9237548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Imagination_Parade/pseuds/Imagination_Parade
Summary: The Lady of the Lake wants to recruit Cassandra to her society of science and magic, and she's not willing to so easily take no for an answer without a fight...and maybe a little bit of magic to help her along the way.An alternate look at the scene from 2x04 "And the Cost of Education."





	

**Author's Note:**

> I keep going back to older episodes with my stories lately, lol. But a writer takes inspiration wherever she can find it, right? Enjoy!

A long time had passed since Cassandra Cillian had been pulled from her job as a hospital janitor and thrown into a life of mystery and magic, but she thinks this might be her strangest day as a Librarian yet. As if walking through a rift and ending up in a dangerous, yellow wonderland weren’t enough, mere moments ago ( _maybe_ ; maybe she’s still in the same moment; she’s not sure how this whole thing works), she had been inches away from becoming the dinner of a tentacle monster. Cassandra thought it looked more octopus than monster, but whatever it was, it had been all too eager to feed itself another few victims, so she’s grateful that she’s now…wherever, whenever she is, in between space and time, floating in what looks like water but doesn’t quite _feel_ like water with three women offering her another very different world.

A cool flame of temptation burns within Cassandra’s belly. She can have everything she wants, the best of both worlds – science and magic – without the fear, without the restrictions, and without the end goal of keeping a lid on magic, the goal that never quite made sense, even to someone as smart as her. Before she gives in, she thinks of her Library, of her newfound family, of all the good she can still do there, and she knows what she has to do. Cassandra looks at the women before her and says, “Thank you, but I already have a job.”

The Lady nods slightly, and Cassandra can’t tell whether she expected this answer or whether she’s surprised her. The Lady glances over each shoulder briefly, looking in turn to the women behind her, and says, “Leave us.”

The other women leave, not by walking or swimming away, but by simply…disappearing, and Cassandra wonders where they went and where they came from and again, where exactly she is. Is she under that field with the tentacle monster? Is she even still in the rift? Is she somewhere else entirely?

She briefly thinks that she hopes she really is frozen in time and life isn’t currently going on without her, or else Lucy has returned, and she has not, and Colonel Baird is probably having a meltdown in the middle of that college back in their world. Before she can think or hope anything else, the Lady begins making her way over to Cassandra (walking? Swimming? Cassandra still can’t tell.)

The Lady comes up close to Cassandra’s side and grabs a wisp of the red hair drifting behind her. She twirls it through her pale fingers, letting the silky locks slip through her grasp.

As if she were reading Cassandra’s mind, the Lady pleads, “We could give you everything you want, you know? A place to explore magic without apprehension. I _know_ that’s what you want, Cassandra.”

“Of course it is,” Cassandra replies. She nervously tries to follow the Lady with her eyes as she continues to play with Cassandra’s hair, slowly drifting around behind her. “Magic’s like…a new higher level of math. Something entirely new to solve.”

“We can help you do that,” the Lady promises.

“I understand the offer,” Cassandra nods.

“You don’t understand how important you could be to our cause,” the Lady tells her.

She’s standing on Cassandra’s opposite side now, facing the same direction as her, her hands gently holding Cassandra’s bare shoulders.

“Where are we?” Cassandra finally asks.

“Another dimension,” the Lady says.

“Same dimension as my Library?”

“Sometimes,” the Lady answers.

Cassandra starts to turn her head to look the Lady in the eyes again, but before she can, the Lady’s leans in close to Cassandra’s ear. Her lip bumps against the curve of Cassandra’s ear, her breath a warm whisper against her flesh.

“This could be your world, Cassandra,” she teases.

The Lady leans down just a little and kisses Cassandra’s slender neck. Cassandra’s eyelids flutter. She leans into the Lady’s lips, warm and firm on Cassandra’s skin. She stumbles (as much as one can stumble when floating in a dreamlike lagoon), and she knows her reaction, this utter weak-at-the-knees feeling that suddenly washes over her, is a little ridiculous and a lot out of nowhere, but it’s been a long time since she’s been kissed by anyone, so Cassandra chalks it up to that and lets out a little sigh. The Lady pulls away, glides around until she’s facing Cassandra again, and curls one single finger underneath Cassandra’s chin.

“You could be _my_ world,” the Lady says softly.

The Lady kisses her lips this time, and, to even her surprise, Cassandra kisses her back, hot and hungry, her hands finding the Lady’s floating blonde hair. Her fingers curl into the Lady’s tresses, tugging lightly as their mouths dance, and Cassandra barely has the ability to even contemplate what’s come over her now, let alone figure out what’s going on.

The kiss continues, and the Lady’s fingers run down Cassandra’s neck, across the bump of her exposed collarbone, and down her chest in an ethereal caress. Cassandra briefly wonders if the Lady’s hand is going to take Cassandra’s flowing dress with her as she feels fingertips flirting around the edges. She’s not sure she’d be all that opposed to that; the way this water, this world, whatever’s happening around her is cradling her skin is unlike anything she’s ever felt before, and Cassandra wants to feel it on every inch of her being, but her dress stays in place as the Lady brushes against her breast on the way to Cassandra’s waist. Their passionate embrace ends with the Lady tugging on Cassandra’s bottom lip as they separate, swollen flesh slipping through the Lady’s teeth.

A moment passes. A gaze is held. Then, the women tilt their heads in the opposite direction and go back in for another kiss, but that moment is all Cassandra needs.

What kind of world has she stumbled into where living underwater is like living on land? How is she breathing? How is she kissing the Lady of the Lake under these conditions? _Why_ is she kissing her like she’s waited her _whole life_ to find this woman? Cassandra’s head had felt unsteady, foggy, _dizzy_ ever since the Lady had placed her lips against Cassandra’s ear, not in the usual bad way that came with an intense synesthetic episode, but not in the good, hazy, lovesick kind of way, either. The only reprieve was when their kiss had momentarily ended, and...

_It’s a spell._

Her thoughts are growing hazier again by the second, but Cassandra knows it’s a spell, a seduction technique to get her to stay, and with a reluctance she’s not sure is really real, she finally pulls away. The Lady tilts her head and purses her lips, her eyes narrowing in a questioning gaze as her hands drop from Cassandra’s waist. Cassandra’s mouth still tingles from whatever magic passed through their kiss.

“I get it,” Cassandra says. “Kissing lowers cortisol levels, which were inevitably highly elevated before you saved me. Oxytocin, promoting bonds and trust. Endorphins and phenylethylamine, for happiness. All things to make me want to stay. But that was more than simple science. That… _did_ more than that. How?”

The Lady smiles, almost with pride, and taps her lips. “It’s the lipstick,” she reveals. “Bewitched with a little attachment spell. Well done.”

“Why?” Cassandra asks.

“Because you just proved exactly why you would thrive here, Cassandra,” the Lady says. “Why you’d be such an asset to the Lake.”

“Well…” Cassandra mutters. She’s not reconsidering, not really, but this opportunity intrigues her like nothing since the Library has, and maybe it’s remnants of the Lady’s spell (her lips are _still_ tingling), or maybe it’s something else, but she’s not ready to slam the door on this just yet, and she hopes the Lake isn’t ready, either. “Is this a one-time-only kind of offer?”

“No,” the Lady replies. “Your place with us will always be here if you want it.”

“Then I think I need to stay with the Library,” Cassandra says. “For now, at least.”

“Very well,” the Lady smiles. “If that’s truly your wish…”

 

She falls back through the rift, back in her blouse and her cardigan, dry as can be, and screams at Baird to close the rift. When it’s done, Baird uncharacteristically pulls her into a hug.

“I’m okay,” Cassandra declares from her place in Eve’s embrace.

“Thank _god_ ,” Baird sighs and pulls out her phone to call for a door.

 

If Jenkins knows what really happened with the Lady of the Lake, if he knows about the kiss and the spell and the seduction that almost, just _almost_ worked, he doesn’t let on. He knows she was tempted; she’s not sure he knows just how much. But he expresses his concerns, she hears him, and then she slips away to find the family she’s chosen to stay with at the local bar.

She finds them in a booth, Stone and Baird on one side, and Ezekiel on the other. When Baird spots her heading towards them, she stands and looks at Stone.

“Get up,” Baird orders as Cassandra arrives.

“Excuse me?” Stone asks.

“You’re sharing with Ezekiel now; get up,” Baird says.

“Why?” he asks gruffly as he slides out of his seat.

“Did you go running off into a dangerous rift today?” Baird asks in an almost sing-song voice. “ _No_. Therefore, I don’t need to make sure I can trap you in the booth.” She looks at Cassandra as Jacob vacates the seat that’s been designated as hers. “Sit.”

Cassandra rolls her eyes, smoothes her skirt beneath her, and slides into the booth, and if it weren’t such a perfect example of why she loves Colonel Baird, she would’ve been annoyed. Jacob declares himself a gentleman and goes to get her a drink. Cassandra looks at Ezekiel across the table, and his face pales.

“What?” Cassandra asks.

“Your…I knew you’d be fine in there, but…that thing almost got you!” he exclaims in alarm. Cassandra shoots him a puzzled expression in return. “Your _lip_. You can’t feel that?”

She can’t, actually, because Cassandra’s fingers shoot to her lips, to the one spot where the tingling hasn’t quite faded away. She thought it was the Lady’s magic, obviously strong, still fading, but she finds the part of her lip that was caught between the Lady's teeth swollen and tender, just a regular leftover of a too fervent kiss.

“Oh…um…I guess it did,” Cassandra says, because what else can she say?

Stone returns with a beer for Cassandra and another for himself as she’s still fingering her reddened lip, and of course, his attention is drawn right to it.

“Is that from the…did that thing almost get you?” Stone asks angrily.

“ _Okay_ , can we _please_ not keep mentioning that?” Baird nearly shouts.

Baird pulls it together immediately and takes a long drink from the bottle of beer sitting in front of her. Stone slides into the booth next to Ezekiel and leans in on a diagonal towards Cassandra.

“Are you okay, Cassie?” he asks softly.

Cassandra holds his gaze for a few seconds; then, before she answers, she glances at Ezekiel and Baird in turn, and she knows she made the right decision.

For now.

**Author's Note:**

> This is all Jamie's fault. She used the word "magic kiss" and "Lady of the Lake" in the same sentence, and then this happened. But I'm pretty glad it did, so thanks so much for reading!


End file.
